Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Educationact.maydaygroup.org/articles/Roberts3_2.pdf · year of our music program at Memorial this fall. He is an award winning pianist and

Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Education

The scholarly electronic journal of

Volume 3, No. 2 July, 2004

Thomas A. Regelski, Editor Wayne Bowman, Associate Editor

Darryl Coan, Publishing Editor

Electronic Article

Who's in the Mirror? Issues Surrounding the Identity Construction

of Music Educators

Brian Roberts

© Roberts, R. 2004. All rights reserved. The content of this article is the sole responsibility of the author. The ACT Journal, the MayDay Group,

and their agents are not liable for any legal actions that may arise involving the article's content, including but not limited to, copyright infringement.

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Roberts, B. (2004). Who's in the Mirror? Issues Surrounding the Identity Construction of Music Educators. Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education. Vol.3, #2 (July 2004). http://act.maydaygroup.org/articles/Roberts3_2.pdf

Who's in the Mirror? Issues Surrounding the Identity Construction

of Music Educators1

Brian A. Roberts, Memorial University of Newfoundland Introduction of the speaker by a local authority:

"I am pleased to be able to introduce to you today our guest

speaker Dr. Brian Roberts who comes to us today from Memorial University of Newfoundland.

Dr. Roberts is a full professor of music education and has a worldwide reputation as a leading scholar in the area of the identity construction of musicians and teachers. In this regard he has published more than 150 articles and books on this and many other topics in the field of music education in many of the leading journals such as the International Journal of Music Education, Research Studies in Music Education, the Bulletin of the Council of Research in Music Education, the Canadian Journal of Research in Music Education and many others. He is a regular conference speaker and invited lecturer across Canada, in the United States, the United Kingdom, Austria, Germany and in Sweden. His doctorate in sociology is from the University of Stirling in Scotland. For 13 years he was the editor of the Canadian Music Educator and his contribution to Canadian music education was recently recognized when he was the recipient of a Lifetime Distinguished Service Award and honorary life membership by the Canadian Music Educator Association."

I am always so incredibly impressed by my introductions because you don't go

around everyday thinking about yourself in quite this way. I can assure you that all those

many claims are true but I would like you to think now a little about who you think I am.

If you were to tell someone, about me – like " I went to this lecture with this guy from the

Brian Roberts

Note

1. Editor: This paper is based on a guest lecture at Richland College, Dallas Texas, April 8, 2003. Given the nature of the content, the student audience, and the strategy of its delivery, the original informal tone is preserved. The opening format, citations, and certain other modifications have been made for the purposes of publication.



university in Newfoundland" – what would you go on to say about who you thought I

was? How might you describe me?

You were given some hints about who I may think myself to be because I wrote

my introduction specifically to tell you some particular things about me. It is, as Stone

(1970) writes, an "announcement" which can take many forms. You might be more

inclined to actually listen to what I have to say if you believed some of that information

from the introduction. I've titled my talk today "Who's in the mirror?" because I am

interested in exploring with you the nature of identity, in particular, yours. It's the person

in the mirror we want to describe. Who is he (or she) and how did he or she get to be that

person? I also want to try to convince you that it is important to know both who you

really are and how you got to be that way.

From the introduction, you will already know that I have spent a considerable part

of my life researching this issue called identity construction. If you have taken any

sociology courses, you may recognize the term "construction". If you've taken some

psychology courses then you will have heard of identity "development", a word that

sociologists tend to avoid; I guess so we don't get confused with the other guys. If you

want to know more about "development" rather than "construction" then you should go

and buy a brand new book entitled Musical Identities (MacDonald et al. 2002). It's not

that there is really that much difference between the sociological version and the

psychological version of identity creation but both academic disciplines seemingly have

their own vocabularies and if this book is anything to base an opinion on, the two

disciplines don't pay attention to one another very much either.

I can tell you that I have spent a considerable amount of time zipping about the

world talking with people about this topic and telling people, often like yourselves, about

how we get to be a musician. But I am mostly interested in how a "musician" gets to be a

music teacher. I am not talking about how to get to be a musician by spending more time

in a practice room than anyone else but about how you convince yourself and others

around you that you are a musician and how you convince yourself that teaching music is



a way that you would like to describe yourself to that reflection in the mirror and to

anyone else who may show some interest.

People can be many things. This is an important concept. They also don't have to

be all of these things at the same time. For example I am also a pilot and until recently

flew my own plane, in fact, a Mooney, which is built just down the road here in Texas.

Again, I could show proof easily enough because I could produce a pilot's license and a

plane ownership certificate.

The sociologist side of my life is quite easy to claim. It is, for the most part, a

claim of identity based on formal education including a PhD and a long series of

publications that are all part of a public record that you or any of your friends can drop

into a good library and find. So when I look into the mirror I can quite easily prove to

myself that the person looking back at me is a sociologist. Since I can demonstrate to

myself and others that I have done and am doing those things that a sociologist does, it's

pretty clear that if I were trying to put a label on my identity that I could safely call me a

sociologist.

I am also the father of an incredibly talented musician who is entering his final

year of our music program at Memorial this fall. He is an award winning pianist and

composer. He is an international gold medal winner for his piano performances and has

won innumerable prizes and awards over his many years of performing. He even has a

graduation diploma in piano performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music based in

Toronto. We'll talk a little more about him later.

I make no apologies for standing here as a sociologist trying to convince you of

these things because I now know from many years of experience that it is very important

that you can willingly identify yourself as a music teacher. I know from experience,

however, that most musicians tend believe only other musicians about musical things, so

I'd like to start the day over if I could.

If you can erase from your memory all that has gone on so far (any Star Trek

junkie will be able to offer you some advice here), we will begin again.



Second introduction of the speaker by a local authority:

"I am pleased to be able to introduce to you today our guest

speaker Dr. Brian Roberts who comes to us today from Memorial University of Newfoundland.

Dr. Roberts took up his position at Memorial University more than 20 years ago after leaving a strong performance career as a concert and operatic tenor based in Germany. He has been invited to perform concert and operatic leading roles across North America, throughout Europe and in South America. Since taking on a more "academic" role in the university music school building he has continued to perform regularly and has performed more recently such works as Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, Bach's St. John and St. Matthew Passions, Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors, Orff's Carmina Burana, Handel's Messiah and Puccini's La Boheme as well as regular appearances on the concert stage. He can be heard frequently on the CBC radio networks and has recorded for EMI. Dr. Roberts hold his doctoral level qualifications in voice from the Hochschule für Musik in Detmold, Germany. Dr. Roberts is a frequent guest speaker and lecturer and works in the area of musician identity."

Who would have guessed? I'll just bet you have a completely different person in

front of you now. If you had to compare these people, how would you make a case for

supporting the identity of either person?

I guess I am a musician too. If you believe any of the information in this

introduction (and it really is all true, too) then you would have to start at the very least

with the benefit of the doubt. So let's look back at my son the piano player as an example

of his struggle to become a musician – not to play the piano but to be accepted by

everyone around him as the musician he believes himself to be; that is, as his musician

identity. And at the same time, I can tell you that my biggest interest in all of this is how

someone like my son, who may choose to become a school music teacher, can navigate

his way through the music school as a musician.



First, we need to look at a few sociological definitions so we are all on the same

page. We keep talking about "identity" as if we all knew what we meant. Well one of the

first lessons in all of this sociology stuff I learned as a student of the discipline is that

there are, in reality, very few concepts or constructs with a thoroughly homogenous,

shared meaning. In other words, we often don't agree even though we use the same

words. So how can we collectively understand "identity"? The best description comes

from McCall and Simmons (1978) when they write that "identity"

may be defined as the character and the role that an individual devises for himself as an occupant of a particular social position. More intuitively, such role-identity is his imaginative view of himself as he likes to think of himself being and acting as an occupant of that position. (p. 65) [speaker's italics]

The really big news, however, is that they go on to say that if a person does not actually

claim "some social identity, other people will force one upon him" (p. 70). So you can

see already that there are many sides to this question in my son's desire to claim an

identity as a musician.

First, he is obligated to assert that he is, in fact, a musician. Secondly, we have to

understand what sort of musician that may be, and thirdly, we also seem to have to

convince everyone else around us that the claim is true. It all sounds like a lot of common

sense to me. But it's a blast when you see how we get on with it because when we really

begin to understand the construction of an identity we can begin to understand why it is

important to construct it in a way that will offer us fulfilling lives in our careers.

McCall & Simmons (1978) also write that those identities (remember I said

already that you could have many more than one) "most in need of support are more

likely to be acted upon, for we strive always to legitimate our conceptions of ourselves"

(p. 81). This is very important because in our face-to-face lives with other people we

often have to assert something about our identity.



I want to reinforce the idea that Lofland (1969) made when he wrote that "for

public purposes and on occasions of face-to-face engagement, one of the clustered

categories [for us that's role identities] is singled out and treated as the most important

and significant feature of the person or persons being dealt with" (p. 124). That's not

really so hard to figure out if you just think about the last time you got sick and went to

the doctor. Now the doctor might be a drag race driver, a stunt pilot, a scuba diver, father,

or many other things; but at that moment what is important to you is that he can fix your

broken arm. In other words, in this face-to-face encounter you are looking for a physician

and really don't care at all that the fellow may be many other things to many other people

at some other time and place.

In fact, this "most important" role identity or "pivotal category" usually begins to

define "who this person is" (Lofland 1969, p. 124). Thus, acts consistent with this pivotal

category become more than just acts; they become the people themselves. Hence, in the

deviant field, acts of murder, rape, and robbery are perpetrated by murderers, rapists, and

burglars. In our discussion today, acts of music making are seen as consistent with people

who are "musicians". In the music education literature there is huge growing awareness

of this relationship between music and identity. For example, David Elliott (1989) writes

about musicians:

They fear that outsiders will not understand and respect them. In short, because music is, in essence something that people make or do, a people's music is something that they are, both during and after the making of music and the experiencing of music (p. 12).

Lofland (1969, p. 127) writes, "whatever is taken as pivotal is Actor – is his

essential nature or core being" (writer's italics). This is a person's identity. In fact, this

pivotal identity category can be so strong and prominent that other people will totally

ignore any and all secondary categories of identity. Again, if we look at deviant

categories we see really good examples of this sort of thing. When we look at a murderer

for example, we don't see a father, a carpenter, a brother, a Knight of the Round Table –



we see a murderer. Hargreaves (1976, p. 204) once wrote, "instead of the act being just

part of the person, the deviant act comes to engulf the person". Thus, the person comes to

view himself as "centrally, pivotally, essentially or really deviant". For the music

education student in the university music school, the desire to be viewed as centrally,

pivotally, essentially or really a musician is the central point of our discussion today.

Much of "identity" is considered by many sociologists to be

"imputed". Hargreaves, Hester & Mellor (1975) write, "the identity the

teacher imputes to the pupil has important consequences for the analysis

of the teacher-pupil interaction and the development of pupil career" (p.

140). In our case, the imputation by Others and Self-as-Other of a

"musician" identity has these same consequences. This notion of

imputation is derived from the labeling perspective.

The University Musician World

Now I'd like to talk about you just a bit, but a little like you weren't here. Music

education students typically view themselves as belonging to a specific social group on

campus. Depending upon the particular university, they typically refer to themselves as

"music students" and as belonging to the "Faculty", "School" or "Department" of music.

They display a sense of belonging, and group spirit. Most of their time is spent together

as a group of music students and they share many of the same pressures and experiences,

both academically and musically. The strongest perceived commonality, and often a

source of irritation and tension among the members of this group, appears to be tied to

the music-making demands in the music school.

For the purposes of our discussion today, the term "music school" will provide the

global boundaries for the inclusion of those students studying music and about whom we

are going to talk. Music students appear to develop a strong sense of isolation from the

rest of the campus and most seem to focus their attention on the social action within the

music school; it appears to them as an "insider group". They often refer to others who



pass through the music school or drop into their cafeteria as "outsiders". The musician's

world seems contained within the walls of the music school. Community membership

appears quite strong and students report that membership is virtually granted instantly

during the "froshweek" activities or other such "welcoming" events. It is a form of social

ritual that confers music student status on the newcomers and these students report that,

once so inducted, they immediately are able to join in the activities as "insiders". At

several universities at which I have conducted much of my research, the students often

talked about the physical separation of the music school from the rest of the campus. At

one music school, the building was physically at the bottom of a rather steep hill and all

other campus activities came to be known to take place "up-the-hill". This comes to be

symbolically referent to all activities outside the confines of the music school as well as

literally to activities that really do take place on the main part of the campus.

The notion of "group" is used here because it will be shown to be important that

there is a central or core membership as well as a periphery membership among the

music students. Despite the tendency of modem sociology to abandon the

acknowledgement of simple structures, the students in my research showed a strong sense

of social bonding – in the basic ways described – with both benefits and obligations, yet

without a necessary commitment to agreement.

Aside from the more obvious "structural" group boundaries, i.e. those bound to

official university structures such as academic year, academic major, applied major, or

assigned ensemble, I am talking about a construct that "community" is a symbolic

structure where the participants perceive the,

reality and efficacy of the community's boundary – and, therefore, of the community itself – [dependent] upon its symbolic construction and embellishment" ... "Community is that entity to which one belongs, greater than kinship but more immediate than the abstraction we call 'society'. It is the arena in which people acquire their most fundamental and most substantial experience of social life outside the confines of the home (Cohen 1985, p.15).



Several other sub-groups have importance to this analysis. Some of these sub-groups are

structurally bounded, such as the "music education majors". These are students in the

music school who have indicated, at least formally, that they wish to become school

music teachers. The other important structurally bounded sub-group is the group of

students referred to as the "performance major". Other less structurally bounded sub-

groups appear to be based around academic year, instrumental major, and particular

performing ensembles. Of course, there are sub-group formations that are of no

immediate importance to our discussion today, but it is perhaps worth mentioning that the

music school is a complex group of students with many varying sub-groups that have

overlapping boundaries, both structurally and symbolically.

The music school can be perceived as a social world having a variety of pushes

and pulls, a variety of actors, a variety of settings, a variety of outcomes. Descriptive

studies, such as Casey (1986), provide quantitative data on almost every possible

parameter imaginable for these variables just enumerated; but after digesting every fact,

every chart of analysis, one is left with the feeling that one is no closer to an

understanding of the social dynamic of the students than one was before. Any comment

concerning the interaction among the peoples of the music school both within and

without is missing.

It comes as little surprise that from these early sociological investigations a

tradition has developed from which field strategies can be selected with confidence and

assurance. There is no longer doubt that the legitimacy of this approach brings us closer

to an understanding of what drives a society. The following excerpt from Crossley &

Vulliamy (1984) concludes this part of my argument: "It is argued that meaning is

derived from social interaction, that subjective meanings are a legitimate focus for study

and that naturalistic research must be conducted in social context"(p. 194).

My comments and analysis today flow, therefore, from data provided by

interviewing more than 100 students and also from participant observation. I only

mention that because I think it is important for you to know that this is not "arm-chair"



theory, but a reflection and consideration of real life experiences made through

observation and interviewing those in this community. Whyte (1955, p.357) came to this

conclusion about 50 years ago when he writes, "It was a long time before I realized that I

could explain Cornerville better through telling the stories of those individuals and

groups than I could in any other way". I'll press on now with a little more about the

nature of this closed world of the music school.

The view of Others as outsiders to the music school leads a like-minded collection

of people, the "group", to consider themselves as "insiders" while the rest of the world is

viewed as outside of this its "group boundary". Although the term "group" enjoys a

popular usage, I employ it here in a specific way to identify those groups of students who

view themselves as a "group" and that this "group" is perceived as distinct and separate

from the rest of the academic activity on campus. I have described the world of university

music students as a "community", largely because it displays characteristics of groups

that students perceived as "insulated" within a geographically separate unit on campus. In

fact, the music community on campus fulfils almost entirely the criteria of the "total

institution" from Goffman (1961), who points out that every institution has some claim

on its members; but for the "total institution", their "encompassing or total character is

symbolized by the barrier to social intercourse with the outside"(1961, p.15).

Music education students make regular claims to this sense of barrier from outside

social interaction. Of Goffman's five rough categories, the music school can best be

viewed as type four, that is, as an "institution purportedly established the better to pursue

some work-like task" (p. 16) (so, it is not totally like a prison, except perhaps towards the

end of term). Music education students frequently report that their life is totally

encompassed within the music school building. While some leave the campus to sleep,

and others merely go to their on-campus residences, they report almost universally the

breakdown of the independence of "sleep, play and work" (p. 17) where they spend so

much of their time at the music school with friends from only the music school and where

"play" of the non-musical variety seems hardly possible except on rare occasions and



then typically with others from the music school. Thus, most of their day is conducted in

the same place with a regular group of others, which is stable in composition and subject

to the same academic regime. The scheduling for these students is imposed by officials,

all to the end that, as Goffman writes, "the various enforced activities are brought

together into a single rational plan purportedly designed to fulfil the official aims of the

institution" (p. 17).

Of course, the degree of split between the "officials" – that being, one might

suppose, members of the Faculty, and the students as "managed group" – I'll leave for the

moment until the discovery of "significant others" is explored later. Of course, it would

be incorrect to lead you into an impression that there is something sinister in this implied

great plan. Music schools are designed specifically for their own purposes. Music

education students, however, are often the victims as well as the heroes of that music

school "community". The "community" is composed of music students, faculty, and staff

and others associated within the general boundaries of the music school and, for our

purposes, the "music school" will be used to identify this social world. Within the music

school, other distinct groups form, with their own social boundaries; and these "sub-

groups", such as the music education students, are often seen by the students themselves

as "marginal-insiders", that is, as music students but not always as members with full

community privileges.

This self-contained unit on campus, where people with a strong common interest

come together, could certainly account for these perceptions. In fact, this sense of

"commonalities" was a critical concept for Rue (1988) in describing a campus

community. The many shared experiences that members of a class have, as well as an

unusually high degree of time spent together certainly makes a difference. But here's the

rub, so to speak.

While students generally describe the music school as a very friendly place where

like-minded people are gathered, it is a well-established sociological tenet that in

homogeneous societies, differences between members are stressed rather than



commonalities. Thus, differences in performing ability can be exaggerated and

confounded by additional institutional social strategies. For example, it is common

knowledge among the students that where the student population is banded into official

academic streams, such as musicology, music education, or performance, that

performance majors will be the superior performers by definition. In the case of voice

majors, a typical world standard seems to be that of all voice majors; the opera class is

the socially defined superior group. In fact it is not uncommon in many music schools

around the world to find the "opera school" isolated physically as well within the music

building complex. In fact, when I was invited to lecture in Göteberg, Sweden, this was

the first comment made to me about the "opera school" folk when I suggested that I drop

in and see the "singers": They had totally isolated quarters at the back corner through

double doors that no one outside the opera group wanted (or perhaps dared) to enter.

This has serious ramifications for students in the other streams trying to construct

identities as superb performers, which in many cases they are. It is often difficult to

justify being able to perform well with a desire to study musicology, composition, or

school music (music education). This is taken as a sign of not being really a serious

musician. This, by itself, has further consequences because students report frequent

examples of members of faculty treating those "non-serious" students with disdain or

worse. Hence, it is significantly more difficult to be accepted as a superior performer in

any of the other academic streams than performance, despite one's ability to play or sing

really well.

Parental concern

Students who come to the music school more often than not come without much

parental support. This places yet another common bond in their path. Students report that

their parents do not see much, if any, occupational security in a music career. Parents also

complain to students about low pay prospects and an education of little "use". This

negative reaction occasionally even extends into the music education field as well. One



student reported that his former secondary vice-principal has said that teaching was "the

last resort for the weak intellect" (Interview M2-6: 16). Most parents support the post-

secondary, degree-getting component of the music school on campus but many would be

happier with a different major for their children.

Students also report that both parents and other outsiders often comment that

music is easy and/or frivolous, confined to the fun of playing a bunch of instruments,

which is obviously easy for the talented few that are admitted. So you can see why there

is a common bond of understanding and like-mindedness that strengthens the social rules

in which music students get to live.

Deviance

Another bonding condition that is often reported is that students claim that

outsiders, frequently including even their parents, often see the music community on

campus as weird, different or otherwise deviant. Becker (1963) writes,

From this point of view, deviance is not a quality of the act

the person commits, but rather a consequence of the

application by others of rules and sanctions to an

"offender", the deviant is one to whom that label has

successfully been applied; deviant behavior is behavior that

people so label (p. 9; italics original).

In fact, it was Becker (1963) who first developed the notion of musicians as deviant. In

his Culture of a Deviant Group he describes the perception of dance musicians as

deviant: "Though their activities are formally within the law, their culture and way of life

are sufficiently bizarre and unconventional for them to be labelled as outsiders by more

conventional members of the community" (p. 79).

Becker begins by pointing out, "the musician is conceived of as an artist who

possesses a mysterious gift setting him apart from all other people" (1963, p. 86). All

students seem to feel the abnormal nature of their musical studies in university life. Aside

from many other considerations, music students feel that their workload sets them apart



from other students as well. There is much support for this and the additional

responsibilities of long hours of practice and ensemble rehearsal makes the claim appear

to be veridical. Music students tend, therefore, to hang around with other music students

and most university friendships seem to come from within the music school community.

Even when, for a brief time, friends are found outside this community, further inevitable

interaction by the friends with other members of the community will usually send these

outsiders running.

The Day-to-Day Life in the Community

Goffman (1967), in his Interaction Ritual, studies the ways in which people

manoeuvre to "make points" in everyday interactions. In the search for analytical

categories and their properties in the music school, it is useful to investigate several

typical ways in which music students collect their "status points" in order to construct an

acceptable identity for themselves within the music school.

Becker (1963, p. 103) reminds us that musicians typically "conceive of success as

movement through a hierarchy of available jobs". Many of these affiliations can be

compared to academically created "jobs", each with its own socially determined place in

the hierarchy, thus providing a different level of point gaining opportunities for each

student involved. There are, in fact, at least eight major categories that students regularly

use for point gaining in the social construction of a musician identity. Each of these

categories, and their sub-sets, cut across the entire music school community with amazing

complexity. You may recognize yourself here.

1. It is important to acknowledge that marks (i.e., "grades") count in a university

music school. Students use marks as currency (money) is used in the outside world

(Becker, Geer & Hughes 1968); more is better. But within the music school, marks seem

always to play more of a structural role. This means that certain levels of mark getting

keeps students in the program of their choice and later makes getting into other programs

a higher probability. Marks, on the other hand, do little for the problem of constructing



an acceptable musician identity either inside or outside the institution. In fact, once a

musician reaches the real world, no one even cares whether you graduated or not! You

just have to play the fiddle better than anyone else does who shows up for the audition.

The notion of a professional school offering degrees that are all but totally ignored by the

profession is another but nevertheless interesting talk.

2. In comparison to marks generally, where they originate does have some

considerable significance. The reputation of the institution plays heavily on the point

getting opportunities. Students seem to have an a priori knowledge of which are the best

music schools, particularly where there is some choice of institution within a reasonable

distance. Several major universities try with little success to promote themselves as the

national (or world) standard. The reality seems to be that for many, although not all

music students, an undergraduate degree is typically sought closest or at least within

reasonable proximity to home. While some schools promote themselves as superior, it is

clear from the entrance results that the majority of admitted students today would get into

almost any institution if they so wished.

Music schools have some distinct staffing problems that can affect their ability to

accept all students they might like to have. Faculty workloads allow for only a certain

number of applied students in any given area. Thus, it is possible for a student to be

rejected simply because the institution has no teacher space available in a particular year.

Therefore, the competition to enter is always a factor of being best suited to a given

number of places, which can change quite dramatically from year to year. Music schools

still like to think that they select the best candidates in any year. However, in some years

these candidates are not equally as strong as in other years, so that the overall standards

in performance vary considerably within the school at any given time. The point getting

opportunities are socially constructed myths that tend to apply to all who are accepted

within the institution generally.

3. One of the most important point gaining factors is the type of music one

associates with in the music school. Elsewhere I have suggested that the entrance



protocol is used to make clear the intent to focus on classical music. Since the students

obviously buy into this social rule, the hierarchy of classical music in the music school

also plays an important role in the establishment of a socially constructed identity as a

performer.

First, then, it is important to reiterate that only an association with classical music

can get a student points. In practice, known association with certain type of non-classical

music such as pop and rock can actually cost students points. In fact, this is one of the

few areas where negative points can be added to one's account. Jazz in certain institutions

can offer points to those in the jazz studies program only. Others would typically be

advised to keep clear of that sort of music. Students often try to get a better deal from the

institution for jazz but are usually rebuffed by the faculty. This varies considerably from

place to place but remains to some extent still a "rule of engagement".

It is not just a matter of "just" classical music either. Within that broad category,

certain types of music are significantly more powerful in the point getting challenge.

Modern, that is weird music, as the students say, attracts few points – much to the chagrin

of the composers on faculty. It is also important to point out that students in any given

institution seem to have learned what the hierarchy of music is for their individual

instrument. This varies from place to place, showing that there is no "master list" and

strengthening the notion that this world is a socially constructed one. The higher on the

list of literature, the more points one attracts. Since this is well known in the community,

students are occasionally seen carrying around, on the top of their pile of books, pieces

high on the hierarchy list but which are not currently being studied in any serious way. In

fact, these pieces are quite likely not possible to play at all for any given student at the

time of this point-attracting theatre. If caught at this deception, the standard and

acceptable defence is to say that you are simple "reading through" some or all of it. On

the other hand, points are awarded for just knowing the hierarchy; so by catching

someone at this deception, by having a feeling for how well the person plays, and the

level of the piece, you can elevate your own point count for the day. This cat and mouse



play goes on continuously. It also leads to many students practising while other students'

ears are placed firmly on the door of the practice rooms. The little windows in the

practice rooms are always covered over to protect the anonymity of the person practising.

4. Senior students sometimes enjoy certain privileges. Academic year is also

relatively easy to determine since most students in the program move together through

the years taking relatively large numbers of classes as a group. Opportunities for point

gathering are better known to more senior students simply because they know the

community better than new students. There are, however, certain situations that cause

some frustration amongst the students. The most common is in competitive music

performance situations where senior students are given advantages because they will be

leaving soon. Senior students generally like this and junior students, particularly those

who fancy themselves as outstanding performers, generally do not. There is often a great

deal of competition for chairs in ensembles or in some cases for entrance to certain

ensembles at all where the institution has a variety of ensembles of differing quality. This

notion of reserving or giving preference to senior students is based loosely on Turner's

"sponsored" or "contest" models (Turner 1960).

This type of junior/senior sponsorship also seems pervasive between major

streams in the music school. Performance majors are regularly sponsored into leading

chairs, ensembles, or opera roles, while other music students in musicology, theory, or

music education are more typically not. There is substantial evidence to show how this

leads to frustration by music education majors who, in many instances in some music

schools, are not allowed to be sponsored into certain chairs or ensembles. This results in

an inability to collect the much-needed points for constructing a superior musician (as

performer) identity. Interference with the purely contest model, by offering selective

opportunities to any preselected group of students, is perceived as a negative force by

those non-eligible students seeking higher status as a musician.

5. Because the music schools have various performing groups to provide

educational opportunities for students, it is clear that where certain types of instruments



(or voices – tenors being the most obvious) are in rare supply and nevertheless in critical

demand, in order to constitute such performing groups, the perceived level of performing

competence or other criteria more generally applied throughout the music school may be

compromised. Students who play rare instruments such as oboe, bassoon or viola get

bonus points just for doing so without regard for how well they might play them. They

also get opportunities to get points more easily than other students because they get to

play in the best ensembles. The "average" piano major can be more or less ignored. The

"average" oboist (or tenor) may be the only game in town.

6. Yet another anomaly for music students is the selection of teachers for

undergraduates. Few first year English majors would be able or are likely to presume to

influence the selection of their English professor in any way. Music students, on the other

hand, regularly go so far as to select an entire institution solely based on their applied

major teacher. There are many ways in which the reputation of the "best" teacher is

constructed but each student will typically claim that he or she is absolutely studying with

the "best," even when both teachers may be in adjacent offices. Many attributes can be

claimed, but the two most conflicting ones remain – "mine can teach" or "mine is a great

performer". Fortunately many, although not all, applied instructors are substantially able

in both areas. Kingsbury (1984, p. 111) writes, "the fact that teachers' prestige is

augmented by their students' success is mirrored by the fact that students draw status

from association with a prestigious teacher".

So everybody's happy! Applied teachers control the social reality of the music

school more than any other group in it. When they hire colleagues, they process the

applicants in a manner similar to the audition used for students, which prevents any

influence that does not support their own value system from gaining a foothold in the

institution. Each new appointment is used to support the investment made by the group

already in place. Thus, the more closely candidates can align themselves with the belief

system already in place the more likely it is that they may find a way into the society. The

process of delaying tenure for a number of years ensures that newcomers maintain that



status until they buy into the system and have personally invested into it totally. Most

faculty members have spent their lives perfecting, to whatever level they are able,

performance skills applicable to classical music. They are not about to let in through the

front door any new faculty member who does not honour that investment. To somewhat

the same extent, this also applies to the students they select for their studios. The more

closely aligned the student's goals are to supporting the valued investment made by the

faculty member the better off the relationship will be. This selection of teacher is so

important for many students to the process of coming to music school that a number of

social strategies have become common to ensure that the outcome is achieved. Students

will typically have their current applied or schoolteacher make early contact with their

university instructor of choice. Students will attempt to study privately with their teacher

of choice in advance of university if they are close enough to do this, thereby letting free

enterprise rules give the advantage to instructor selection.

Part of the talent show of the audition is for the selection of students by applied

teachers (Hopper 1971, p. 94). This allows for the pretence that such teacher-student

pairings are fair, and the selections are formalized through this process despite the fact

that many have been made through sponsorship in advance. Various teachers seem to

offer a different number of status points to students despite the obvious conflict in how

the values are constructed.

7. I mentioned earlier that some "chairs" and ensembles offer more points than

others. In fact, this is a very important process, particularly in larger music schools where

there are many ensembles from which to choose. For some ensembles, an audition is

required. This, by itself, will increase the point count. In bands and orchestras the "chair"

is also an important point determining factor, so much so that students often must make a

decision about playing first chair in a lower ranked ensemble instead of playing a lower

ranked chair in a higher ranked group. When sponsorship for a certain academic year or

programs comes into play, this can become a very vexing difficulty for students who are

actively seeking points. It must be pointed out that the quality differential is often



appreciable between these various performing groups; and the members of faculty also

compete severely, just like the students, for a place in front of the "best" groups. This has

a reciprocating benefit in the community since faculty gain points based on the ensemble

they direct and association with these faculty members in other venues can affect

students' point-gathering opportunities.

Performing ensembles can develop very specific and unique cultures. At one

music school in the study, the members of the top choir became self-acknowledged

elitists. The members ate in isolation from all others in the cafeteria and hardly talked to

anyone outside the group anywhere in the music school itself. Certain other ensembles

were considered the "dumping" ground for the weak and feeble players unable to find a

more prestigious group in which to perform, and performing in them could actually lose

students points! The normal defence for having to play in such a low status group was

that the sponsored model of selection made it imperative since the student may only be in

first year, for example. Students commonly refer to playing in such low status groups as

"sentences to serve". It is clear that the point gaining opportunities for these ensemble

"jobs" is so great that one can clearly understand the aggravation that accumulates when

sponsorship models dictate which opportunities are available instead of the application of

a purely competitive entrance model. This plays an even more predominant role in the

social construction of an acceptable musician identity for groups such as music education

majors since sponsorship is often attributed first to performance majors.

8. Because the institution uses sponsorship so readily academic programs –

particularly the performance stream, which most closely support the faculty's investment

– points can be gathered simply by being in such programs. Other streams, such as music

education, offer few points to students. The ultimate irony, of course, is that with the

generally low opportunity for classical music performance in society in general, it is

much more likely that music education graduates will actually be the ones to go on to

make music with their school ensembles and thereby replicate the process in the music



school where they had such difficulties gathering sufficient points to construct an

adequate musician identity in the first place.

Many other minor point-gaining opportunities occur on a less frequent basis than

these eight. Scholarships and competitions both inside and exterior to the institution are

used. External opportunities to work in classical music venues help also. Special

workshops with famous musicians or teachers are used. Certain music school courses

have points attached and are open only to certain academic streams thereby making it

impossible for other students to avail themselves of the points. Some music schools even

have tried to assign specific practice room space to performance majors on the dubious

claim that, for example, it is only reasonable that piano performance majors should

practice on grand pianos while students in other streams can do quite adequately on

uprights.

All point gathering eventually takes on the appearance of a series of status

passages where students see each passage as desirable but often lacking in clarity. As

Glaser and Strauss (1971) point out, where insufficient notice by others is taken of these

various status passages that individuals can be led into, the result in some cases can be

what these authors describe as a crisis. They write, "a status passage may tend to be so

competitive that it blots out, if only temporarily, the priority claims of other passages"(p.

144). Thus, some students appear to seek competitive entry into certain performing

ensembles, into certain teacher's classes, and into certain academic programs only for the

purpose of gaining the points and achieving a status passage without much forethought as

to the long-term consequences of such actions.

The apparent theory is that the greater number of available rewards, the greater is

the likelihood that conflict over those rewards will arise. Since the institution offers all

students large numbers of performing opportunities, conflict for asserting one's place in

the scheme of things is often severe since most students can claim to be eligible for some

or all of the opportunities on some basis. Scholarships play a significant role as status

rewards because they can be assigned criteria that make them musical awards rather than



academic awards. Because music making is an academic exercise in the music school,

there would appear on the surface to be little conflict; but students report that

scholarships are used to "buy" necessary ensemble instruments (like oboists) from among

applicants, as well as students of high musical potential rather than just high academic

potential. Students also saw scholarships as faculty tools to "buy" loyalty both to

individual faculty and to the school itself. My studies found that, in some instances, even

university rules, regulations, and academic standards had been changed or ignored to

accommodate students who performed really well or played "rare" instruments. While

sensitivity to students' needs is always the official response, more often than not it is the

institution's needs that are being most flagrantly promoted, instead.

In summary, the availability of point gaining opportunities is of the greatest

importance to music school students in ensuring a successful series of status passages

into the acceptable musician identity each student is wishing to construct. The conflict

between competitive and sponsored models creates the most tension in this community.

The Music School "Musician"

To be a music student is to be a performer. Despite the many other things that are

contained in the curriculum for music students, the single socially required identity is that

of a performer. In my interviews at a larger Faculty of Education,2 on the first day of

classes, all students' self-descriptions were as an instrumental appendage: "Hi, I'm John

and I'm a trumpet major!" or, "Hi, I'm Amy and I'm a soprano!" What was interesting in

this is that all of these students were recent graduates of a music school and were now

registered in the Faculty of Education with the express purpose of becoming teachers. In

instances where a student is unable to construct a satisfactory performer identity, an

attempt to create a more generalized identity as a musician is substituted. This latter

category tries to take into account the more general or broader view of what it is to know

about music. It does not, however, equal in any sense the performer identity. In this

connection it is also very important to reiterate the limits on the kind of acceptable

Brian Roberts

Note

2. Editor’s note: In the system in question is often referred to as the 4+1 qualifying path, since students first attend a music school and obtain a music degree, then study one year in a Faculty (or School) of Education to obtain teaching skills and credentials.



musical literature which allows the satisfactory collection of sufficient points to enable a

student to achieve an acceptable socially constructed identity as a performer. Students do

not typically agree with this position but nevertheless come to accept these conditions

during their time in the music school.

It must also be noted that the music school requires all students to perform. While

these are generally understood as "opportunities", for those students less inclined toward

constructing an acceptable performer's identity, these opportunities are viewed more

often as torture. Thus it is that you either construct an identity for yourself or others will

do it for you!

There has been considerable research showing that this cultural hegemony

continues into the music education arena in the lower schools as a direct result of

teachers' education in the university music schools (e.g., Rose 1990). Students in the

music school who are really successful can garner the support of like-minded professors

who provide letters of recommendations for the advancement of students' careers.

Students who do not bend to the party line are viewed as non-serious musicians, inept

musicians, or worse.

There are many challenges presented to students in their search for a performer

identity. It may be incorrectly considered that I, like Goffman before me, can be criticised

for attempting to portray, in my case, the music schools, inappropriately. Concerning this

line of criticism, Giddens (1987) writes:

Goffman is thus held to portray an amoral social universe,

in which everyone is busy trying to manipulate everyone

else. But this is far removed indeed from the main thrust of

his writing . . . If day-to-day social life is a game which

may be on occasion turned to one's own advantage, it is a

game into which we are all thrust and in which

collaboration is essential (p. 113).



Music students choose to go to university music schools. No one forces them to

attend and they can always leave. In my account thus far, however, it may seem as

though the students merely produce their little social plays and then their success in the

construction of a musician identity is assured. You may also have come to the conclusion

that these strategies are "obvious," as they may seem as though they always work and that

they are fixed in their ability to offer a given number of points. Unfortunately, life is not

that simple and these strategies do not always work. In order to construct a "grounded

theory" (Glaser & Strauss 1967), one must take into account classes of social action

which might be explained by the theory. Yet, because students who are engaged in social

episodes using the strategies that the theory has unearthed can still be unsuccessful, the

theory appears not yet to be fully unpacked. Social action in the music school is not

confined to "presentation" strategies. It is neither the "presentation" (Goffman 1959) nor

the "announcements" (Stone 1970) (like my introductions today) that ultimately count

but, rather, the "ratification by significant others" (Foote 1951, p.484).

The music school is a very competitive place. In fact, music students describe the

music school in the first instance as a competitive environment. Kingsbury (1984) writes

about his encounter in the conservatory by acknowledging an "ever present weave of

intensely competitive social relationships"(p. 11). There are, of course, real competitions

for scholarships and solo opportunities (although many are confounded by faculty

sponsorship), but it is the general tone or atmosphere of competition pervading the music

school that cannot be explained away by the few real competitive opportunities. There is

a great deal of petty backstabbing and an overwhelming focus on oneself. One does not

simply attend classes in the anonymity of the back corner of the room. You are constantly

on display in a day-to-day battle to get, and to keep, a reasonably decent view of yourself,

almost exclusively through various performing opportunities (obligations). What seemed

good yesterday needs reinforcement or confirmation today. There is always the threat of

identity demotion. Students are also forced into the role of critic when they are required

to comment after concerts they are obliged to attend. It is important to remember that



some sort of musician identity will be forced upon the student (McCall & Simmons 1978,

p. 70) in the absence of a strong self-made alternative by a claim or announcement to the

contrary (Stone, 1970). We are reminded of Elliott's comment that "a people's music is

something they are"(Elliott 1989, p. 12). Thus, when the "musician" enters this identity

competition, it is "self" that is dragged kicking along behind. This can translate into "I am

a bad singer = I am a bad person".

The music school society is organized socially in ways to both promote this

competition and to help protect students from this same competition. "Sects" develop

based on shared instruments, teachers, years, ensembles, and other options, and these are

useful for promoting the interests of both the sect and the individuals within it, often to

the detriment of others in the community.

Faculty members are willing partners in this social order and do much to promote

and continue the status quo. Their own personal professional investment as a classically

trained and classical performing musician needs much of the same negotiation and

validation as that of the students, albeit on a different level. Nevertheless, faculty have as

much of "self" at stake in the music school as performers and are regularly seen in public

concerts or in front of students performing. They, too, must seek "valued others" to

validate their own claims. In addition to peers, these "valued others" also include their

students. They require the same support for their identity constructions as their students

and they suffer from many of the same challenges, for their world is also a highly

competitive one.

In the end, the primary operational reality of the music school becomes the

reproduction of a cultural reality in which the social investment as a classical performer

by the members of faculty is protected, supported, and enhanced. This turns out to be the

main delimiting factor in what kind of music is valued, and taught to be valued; and it is

subsequently the defining basis for the incompatibilities between credentials and need

concerning the "musician" identity on the part of school music teachers.



Musical skills from other venues of world musics, including other forms of

popular Western music – pop, rock, jazz, etc. – are typically more than missing from the

university music school; typically they are actively demoted as of little or no value, or

hidden away in some corner and program such as "jazz studies", and thus kept out of the

mainstream of the school. This is one area that in recent years is showing some

considerable improvement, but we are not close to any sort of social integration yet.

While it might be kind to suggest that the presence of composers and

ethnomusicologists on university campuses might ameliorate this situation, they do not.

Chris Small (1987) says it best when he writes,

The majority of university music departments are still stuck

in an exclusive concern with the past . . . Like all

institutions, universities on the whole tend to be intolerant

of genuine innovation . . . Tame artists, in fact, make good

pets for university establishments as long as they do not

attack their masters (for real at any rate). (p. 176).

The Next Part

The purpose of my on-going research has been not only to display the contents of

this social world, but also to develop a theory to account for the social action of music

education students in the music school, and it is to this goal that I now turn.

Theory of Social Action of Music Education Students

It may be of some use to state briefly just what a sociological theory might be.

Perhaps the shortest definition is offered by Denzin (1978, p.47) for whom theory is

explanation. One might pursue this notion of explanation by unpacking it. Chafetz (1978,

p.2) would have us believe that theory can be described as follows: "Once something is

established as existing, theories constitute systematic attempts to answer the general

question "why". However, "why" is not the only question that might be asked. In fact, it



may not always be very salient at all. The most important explanation may have more to

do with the "how". Thus we return to Denzin (1978, p. 48) who develops his concept

more generally by explaining that theory "permits the organization of descriptions, leads

to explanations and furnishes the basis for the prediction of events as yet unobserved".

One is led eventually to see that the socially created "what" is concerned with the

processes of students constructing a "master status" (Hughes, 1945) as a musician. By

carefully examining the what, the question becomes more centrally one of discovering

how these students are able to establish an identity (McCall and Simmons, 1978) as a

musician in their social world.

I am going to limit my discussion now to the exposition of substantive and formal

theory, and as Glaser and Strauss (1967) write, "often the substantive and formal theories

are formulated by different authors"(p. 80). One does not begin each analytical exercise

in theoretical vacuum, however; nor is it possible simply to borrow formal theories and

show how they may apply as a demonstration of theoretical validation. My research is not

about theoretical validation but about theoretical generation.

Sometimes the clues pointing in a certain theoretical direction lead the researcher

into places that are totally unexpected at the outset; and, of course, one does not "prove"

the connection with any grand theory. Clearly, the link with "grand theory" is impossible

to "ground" in the same sense. One tends to merely add to or subtract from its

plausibility. This is not surprising since much grand theory is incapable of verification in

the same way.

I'll offer an example. In the world of music, perspectives are often changed to

relocate the audience's attention. One not so common but nevertheless adequate example

is found in the operatic setting of "La Boheme". Most people having a passing

acquaintance with opera will recognize the story of Rudolfo (tenor) and Mimi (soprano)

falling in love and their ultimate separation and her untimely death. This is Pucinni's

perspective. In the background, the story of Marcello (baritone) and Musette (contralto)

continues as "fill" for the main action presented down stage. But for Leoncavallo, who



also set an almost unknown version of "La Boheme," the real action was in the story of

Marcello (tenor) and Musette, while the Mimi and Rudolfo (baritone) action is set in the

background. It is as if one were viewing the same opera, but watching from different

sides of the stage.

While this detour into opera may appear somewhat removed from the present

issue, it is precisely this radical change in perspective that pointed to a workable starting

place for the unpacking of the "how" in the generation of my theoretical position. For

example, the labelling perspective in sociology is well known in the study of deviance. It

is argued, however, that deviance is a relative thing, and as Furlong (1985, p.126) writes,

"labelling theorists argue that people break the rules of society in minor ways all of the

time".

As outlined by Furlong, this position is a typical formulation in the literature to

account for the relative stance that the social acts themselves cannot account for the

identification of a deviant because many people who break the rules of society simply

never become known as deviants. In fact, the labelling perspective seems obviously more

about the Actor than the Act. Kai Erikson writes (1962) that "deviance is not a property

inherent in certain forms of behaviour; it is a property conferred upon these forms by the

audiences" (p. 308). It seems a moot point to argue that an Act is or is not deviant when

the focus of the labelling perspective is more appropriately directed toward other things.

Therefore, if the processes of labelling are to withstand the test, the issue of the deviant

act is redundant. In its purest sense, the labelling perspective provides a way of

explicating forms of social action. In fact, Plummer (1979) writes that, "labelling theory

is, in principle, applicable to any area of social life, deviant or non-deviant"(p. 108).

It is to his perspective that I now turn. Plummer (1979, p.86) argues that the

labelling perspective is one "whose core problems are the nature, emergence, application

and consequences of labels". At this level of abstraction, there is no mention of deviance.

By way of an introduction, it may be useful to show how a deviant perspective

found in the labelling literature came to be viewed as a source theory for my analysis of



the social world of music education students. The labelling perspective seems to concern

itself with groups of people who are viewed in a common sense way as deviant; hence the

often graphic titles in the literature such as Liazos' The Poverty of the Sociology of

Deviance: Nuts, Sluts and Perverts. This view, suggests Becker (1973), makes it difficult

to study these groups because "they are regarded as outsiders by the rest of the society

and because they themselves tend to regard the rest of society as outsiders"(p. 168). But

much of what counts as deviant in a common-sense understanding is less than clear.

While one might jump at the opportunity to claim that murder, the premeditated

killing of a human being, may be taken as a clear case in point, we are reminded that, in

many cases, killing someone is not viewed in a way that might gain one the label of

"murderer" at all. If one's life is threatened and one reacts to defend one's own being, then

society seems more willing to accept the act of killing someone else in this case as

legitimate in the form of self-preservation. Society has developed categories to render the

act of killing safe from labelling consequences. Society seems prepared in practice, rather

more than in theory, to assess a social act within the context of social meaning

established by a society. In legal terms, pornography is often defined by community

standards. Thus it is left to a group of people, typically judges and juries, who, at least

symbolically (Cohen, 1985), represent the collective meaning for the interpretation of a

social act. Cohen (1985) writes,

the quintessential referent of community is that its members make, or believe they make, a similar sense of things either generally or with respect to specific and significant interests, and, further, that they think that that sense may differ from one made elsewhere (p. 16).

Therefore the label and socially applied meaning can be legitimately claimed to belong to

the music education community, and that the understanding and use of the term by that

community will be reflected in their social action.

Hargreaves (1975) describes a group's culture by suggesting that, when we consider the culture (or ideology) of a group, we are mainly concerned with the fact that groups have values,



beliefs and norms. The focus is on the homogeneity of the members; we are stressing what they share in common. A group's values are the over-all guides to group behaviour, for it is the values which express what the' members regard as good, ideal and desirable (p. 90).

We can therefore expect to see evidence in the social action of the music education

students of such homogeneity with respect to the meanings assigned by this group to the

label "musician".

In fact, it appears as though a group, or Cohen's symbolic community, need only

express its cultural values, beliefs, and norms. In the case of the legal interpretation of

pornography, communities have taken the position that they have this right and it is not

uncommon to hear of cases in the courts. Therefore, definitions of deviance – or for that

matter, varieties of conformity – can easily be shown to be at least partially dependant

upon a community position. Consider, for example, Erikson's (1966) interpretation of the

Puritans as a rather powerful example of such definitional action by a community. He

writes, "many sociologists employ a far simpler tactic in their approach to the problem –

namely, to let each social group in question provide its own definitions of deviant

behaviour" (p. 6) and this stance is the one adopted with respect to the meanings

attributed to the label "musician" by the students in my research.

I would like therefore to stress once again the point that the music school is a

"closed society" in which operational rules are determined within that society alone. This

means that a lot of common-sense answers outside such a closed society simply don't

apply and you must look to the social rules within the particular closed society for

meanings and norms.

I want to move back to identity again now, simply because it would take several

hours to move step by step from this point in theory development to actually get back to

the essential issue today.

The labelling perspective has given some prominence to the notion of identity.

Hargreaves (1976, p.201) discusses four factors he considers important for a pupil in the



acceptance of a label "as part of his identity". Later in his paper Hargreaves focuses on

the more central issue for music education students when he writes, "instead of the act

being just part of the person, the deviant act comes to engulf the person" (p. 204). This

construct of engulfment, or from Hughes (1945), of "master status", appears to best

describe the pivotal importance that music education students place on the performer

label as their identity in the music school. This is perhaps required because of the

immense amount of general musicking that takes place in the music school. Thus, public

exposure of a successful labelling becomes even more important where the validating act

is so commonplace. As an aside, this social process also seems to explain the apparently

frequent need of some teachers to reinforce the "musician" label by promoting the 'public'

social act of conducting school ensembles as opposed to other curricular needs, especially

of students not in ensembles.

The most significant departure in the application of the labelling perspective to

explicate the social action of music education students rests with the reversal of the

typical attitude of the recipient of the labelling. The labelling perspective has been

criticized because it is seen as directing its efforts towards fields which are "in fact

commonly recognized as deviant" (Plummer, 1979, p. 97) and it is also seen as useful in

studying the helpless or powerless, the "underdog" (see Gouldner, 1968). We are

reminded of this most crudely when Plummer (1979, p. 89) cites Akers,

People go about minding their own business, and then 'wham', bad society comes along and slaps them with a stigmatising label. Forced into the role of deviant, the individual has little choice but to be deviant (Akers, 1973, p. 24).

Music education students could never wish for a more perfect world than one

where bad society could just come along out of the blue and slap them with a musician

label that would stick. In the absence of this perfect world, they engage in interactional

strategies specifically designed to bring about this labelling. The question in my analysis

can also be formulated from the reverse perspective: What happens if a person seeks to



be labelled as a particular type, that is, seeks overtly to develop an identity as a musician

based in large measure upon the societal reaction by Others?

Music education students want to be labelled a "musician". The labelling

perspective has been criticized strongly because it is seen to ignore the sources of

deviancy. It appears not to concern itself with the original motivation for the first deviant

act (Gibbs, 1966). But much of this concern centres on the social problems of deviancy

rather than the sociological problems. It is perhaps of some importance to the social

problem of killing someone to determine the motivation for the original act because we

find murder socially offensive. But hardly anyone could be expected to find social

offence in wishing to become a school music teacher!

In fact, it is not the first act as a musician that holds much interest at all. It is as

the secondary-deviant (see Hargreaves et al. 1975, p. 5), that is, with the continuing

search for affirmation as a musician that my research concerns itself. Of course,

musicians have been studied as a deviant group before. The most significant for this

analysis is Becker's (1963) essay on the "Culture of a Deviant Group", which, as

mentioned earlier, uses dance musicians in Chicago as a case study.

We turn now to the criticism that the labelling perspective is a vacuous tautology

when it suggests that things are as they are, simply because they are defined so by others.

Saragin (1967) notes that,

Becker's statement is not a definition and should not be confused with one. It merely delineates the self-process by which the labelling of a person, or a group of persons, in the category of deviant is made, but fails to note the characteristics that deviants have in common, and those which are utilized by oneself and others to give persons that label (p. 9).

Therefore, as Plummer (1979) writes, "it is possible to say the same things as

Becker about almost any other form of behaviour: conformity is behaviour that people so

label"(p. 95). But without trying to question any validity in this criticism that may be

legitimate, when the very essence of the labelling perspective as a form of identity



construction is taken, it might very well be reasonable to assign criteria to labels. This

could make it possible to use the labeling perspective to explain the identity construction

with any form of "master status". In fact, Friedson (1965) suggests that "sociologists

might profit from paying more attention to the aggressive aspects of the labelee' s role in

the process of label designation . . . the general tendency of labelling studies to

concentrate on the passive rather than the aggressive aspects of the labelee, on the

'coerced imputation' of a label rather than the 'chosen internalization' of a label"(p. 98).

The notion that an individual can seek to be labelled as a particular type of person,

for example, the music education student seeking to be labelled a musician, appears to be

not so fundamentally incongruent with the labelling perspective after all. Erikson (1968)

writes, "a person can 'engineer' a change in the role expectations held in his behalf rather

than passively waiting for others to 'allocate' or 'assign' roles to him"(p. 338). Thus, it

might be expected that music education students engage in theatrics that seek labelling

from others in order to validate their claim on a musician identity.

We now turn to the notion that Hargreaves (1976, p.204) develops when he writes

of the engulfment of the person by the deviant act. The concept of identity as "master

status" (Hughes, 1945), seems most appropriately borrowed from the literature on

deviance.

In order to focus our attention on this pivotal identity component, we need only

remind ourselves that the questioned music education students insisted they wished to be

seen as good musicians over all else! While Hargreaves, Hester & Mellor (1975) write

that the labelling perspective considers the process of naming or typing in a particular

way, they continue by noting that the process,

asserts that the naming of certain kinds of persons "deviants" – and the treatment that often accompanies such naming, can have particular consequences . . .and paradoxically, these consequences can reinforce, strengthen or increase the deviant conduct which labelling is perhaps intended to punish, diminish or remove (p. 144).



But if the labelees, the music education students, are out in their social world

looking for someone to label them, there is every reasonable expectation that such

labelling would in fact increase, strengthen, or reinforce their perception of themselves

and their identity as a musician. Hargreaves, Hester & Mellor (1975) suggest that

teachers type or categorize pupils in several stages. The final stage is stabilization, which

the authors describe as the point "at which the teacher has a relatively clear and stable

conception of the identity of the pupils" (p. 145). But for the music education student, the

process of developing a truly stabilized identity appears almost doomed from the start.

When, as we have seen, music students elect to proceed in the music education rather

than the performance stream, and still search for an identity as a musician that they seem

to define as a performer, and when they elect to proceed in the music education stream,

thereby not electing the performance stream, they work directly against the most obvious

clue as to their idealized identity. They cannot simply assert their identity effectively

because they perceive that they have structurally denied it. Thus, to preserve and capture

labelling opportunities in order to sustain such an identity as a musician, they see the

need to seek to be labelled and to seek ways to disassociate themselves from the music

education stigma.

Hargreaves, Hester & Mellor (1975) write, "it is through the stigmatization that

the labeller's conceptualization of the pupil as a deviant person comes to make its impact

on the pupil's identity"(p. 204). The data in my study clearly show that the music

education stream in the music school is viewed by students and most faculty as a

stigmatised group! In consequence, as a strategy for developing dis-identifiers, music

education students seek what Goffman (1963, p. 43) refers to as prestige symbols rather

than the stigma symbols. That is, not seeing many positive identity constructs in the

music school for the music educator, they seek to be seen as performers and thus dis-

identify themselves with the music education world in favour of the more prestigious

performer identity.



The tradition within social science originating in the labelling perspective thus

provides a source position to elucidate the social actions of the music education student

wishing to construct an identity as a musician for himself. For the identity of this student

rests on his ability to see himself and be seen by others as the musician that he wishes

himself to be and that he sees the music school appearing to foster. When the student is

successful enough in dis-identifying from the stigmatised group, it might be suggested

that his wish to become a music teacher is at best a neutral identity component; and in

many cases this is perhaps even a strongly negative identity component for those who

appear less able to engulf themselves in the musician identity.

Cultural Hegemony

Now we can go back to where we left off earlier and finish up with a brief look at

why all of this is important anyway. The cultural hegemony propagated upon all

potential music educators by the university music schools is appreciable. Barrow and

Milburn (1990, p. 249) make one of the most successful attempts to chase the definition

of "profession". The authors are no doubt right when they suggest that "professional" is a

"hurrah" word for teachers. But teaching is a profession to the degree it relies on the fact

that there is a substantial body of professional knowledge required. Unfortunately, the

music schools in almost every university are solely responsible and empowered to

provide a significant amount of this knowledge base, often both musical and educational.

Thus, the real needs for the teacher's musical self are not being met through the exclusive

cultural hegemony of the music schools. These gatekeepers control the pool of all

applicants for music education degree programs and they control the orientation and

value set associated with the types of music that will ultimately form the basis of the

professional knowledge that the teacher takes into the classroom. Furthermore, if they are

compared as discrete sources of knowledge, the course load of education studies

represents a miniscule percentage of a music teacher's knowledge base in comparison to

the overwhelming proportion of music studies. Of course, unaddressed here is the reply



that this situation simply fits the general thesis of most university professors that the

ability "to do" the subject is not only a necessary but also completely sufficient condition

for teaching it. This is just generalized to public schools – and increasingly so by

conservatives for all subjects of study – on the argument that to "teach music" you must

be a "musician," the final rite of passage of which is often giving a formal graduation

recital.

After all of this you might wonder what the point is. Music education students go

to university and "learn" to construct an identity as a performer. They have little or no

choice in this. In fact, to some degree the process has already begun beforehand, which is

both how and why they have gained entrance to the music school in the first place. The

socially constructed tools that students learn to do this with are available in abundance in

music schools and, from the institutional point of view, while it might be nice to share

some other concerns about their future lives in a classroom, for the moment at least, life

can happily move along with everyone sticking to their musician self.

After graduation as a music teacher, you move into a professional life in school

where you will find little or no socially constructed support for your "musician-

performer" self. There is considerable support for a "teacher self" in a school. While this

may not come as a huge surprise, it comes with a big price for music teachers who are

still tied to their identity as a performer. Again, as I hinted at earlier, teachers conducting

ensembles continue this public identity for reasons and consequences that are often quite

apart from – and, some would argue, contrary to – larger curricular matters affecting all

students, not just the selected few. An identity is very hard and frustrating to support

without the ratification of others. Identities sought but not supported can lead people into

considerable personal distress. While the school system will acknowledge your

musicianship (in fact it might even demand it to get the job in the first place), it is not

equipped in any real sense to support it in the socially constructed ways that you have

become used to.

It is for these reasons that every effort must be made within the schools of music



and education at the university to help you create firstly an identity as a teacher who,

secondly, happens to have, and teaches on the basis of, an extraordinary and highly

developed musical skill. If that can be achieved, music education students can learn to

live happier lives within the music school and prepare themselves for a fully socially

constructed support of their essential "educator" identity when they graduate and enter

the work place.

So after all that has gone on today and after the earlier enlightening introductions,

I ask you again: Who am I? Well, I teach musicians to be teachers. My background

allows my students to accept what I have to say musically because they understand that I

spent a considerable amount of my life as a professional performer. In the end, my

experiences teaching and supporting teaching as a positive source of 'self', or identity are

the focus of what I try to provide my students. It is like a war, where the teaching self and

the musician self battle it out for control over the person. Unlike most wars, however, we

don't really want a winner. It is in the struggle that we can keep both our musical self and

our teacher self alive and both must be strong to produce the kind of great music teacher

we want in front of our students.

Notes 1 Editor: This paper is based on a guest lecture at Richland College, Dallas Texas, April 8, 2003. Given the nature of the content, the student audience, and the strategy of its delivery, the original informal tone is preserved. The opening format, citations, and certain other modifications have been made for the purposes of publication. 2 Editor's note: In the system in question is often referred to as the 4+1 qualifying path, since students first attend a music school and obtain a music degree, then study one year in a Faculty (or School) of Education to obtain teaching skills and credentials.

Note: sections of this lecture have been previously published.



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Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Educationact.maydaygroup.org/articles/Roberts3_2.pdf · year of our music program at Memorial this fall. He is an award winning pianist and